Many athletes and non-athletes utilize weight lifting or weight training exercises to build strength and/or bulk, to prevent injury, or to improve overall condition and appearance. Typically, weight training exercises are performed with either exercise machines or free weights, i.e., barbells and weighted plates, dumbbells, etc. For various reasons, most exercise programs incorporate both machines and free weights in a variety of different exercise routines in order to maximize the effect of working out a desired number of muscle groups.
Free weights offer a number of advantages over exercise machines. For instance, they are relatively inexpensive in comparison to exercise machines. Free weights are also more versatile because a variety of exercises can be performed with one set of weights, whereas most exercise machines are designed for only one exercise. Even though some exercise machines accommodate more than one exercise, the cost of these machines usually increases proportionately with the number of exercises. Use of dumbbells also enables both arms to be exercised independently. Finally, free weights are popular among many weight lifters because the lifting movements are not restricted to prescribed planes of motion or prescribed angles.
Nevertheless, there are also a number of inherent disadvantages associated with free weights. One such disadvantage relates to safety. Although most weight room instructors strongly advise against an individual working out by himself or herself, this cautionary measure is particularly important when the lifting of free weights is involved. This is due to commonly recognized dangers such as the possibility of dropping a weight on a body part, or becoming trapped beneath a bar, which could easily occur in exercises such as bench press, incline press or squat. Additionally, through carelessness, loading and unloading of heavy weighted plates onto the ends of a bar sometimes results in an unbalanced bar that falls downward from its rack.
Another disadvantage associated with some free weight exercises relates to the body positioning required to perform a prescribed maneuver. The location of the weights with respect to the body may be awkward and/or dangerous. Finally, due to gravity, for some movements designed to exercise a muscle group in a particular way, a weight resistance simply cannot be applied against the muscular movement without a machine. One such exercise movement is referred to as a behind the neck pulldown. This movement exercises a muscle group which includes the latissimus dorsi, the rhomboids, the anterior and posterior deltoids, and the trapezius. Starting with arms extended above the head, the exerciser pulls downwardly to a position behind the neck. Thus, the motion is downward and rearward, while the applied resistance against this muscle group is directed upwardly and forwardly.
Perhaps an exercise maneuver which best exercises this muscle group through this motion is a pull up performed with arms spread, palms facing forward and, in uppermost position, with the head of the exerciser pulled up in front of the bar. During this motion, the weight resistance of the body applies downward force, but there is also some forward resistance felt by the exerciser, because the torso moves forward as the body is pulled upwardly. With arms extended, the bar is in front of the head. When the body is pulled up, the bar is behind the head.
While a pull up performed this way is an extremely effective exercise for the above-described muscle group, it also has a number of limitations. First, many people simply cannot lift their own weight, and this manner of pull up requires that the exerciser be able to lift at least his or her weight. Second, a pull up cannot be performed one-handed. One important aspect of weight training involves the isolation of muscle groups on both sides of an exerciser's body, so that the arms or the legs can be exercised independently, or simultaneously, depending on the circumstances. Particularly during rehabilitation, single limb exercise enables an exerciser to measure and compare the relative strength of an injured limb to the strength of the healthy limb, so that rehabilitation progress can be monitored.
Some exercise machines provide a pulley/cable exercise device referred to as a lat pulldown, wherein a pulley restricted bar is held at opposite ends and pulled downwardly by an exerciser to a position behind the head, from either a seated or kneeling position. For several reasons, this motion does not work the above-described muscle group as effectively as the pull up.
First, the resistance is directed upwardly, or vertical, with no transverse resistance felt by the exerciser. While an exerciser using this device may lean the torso forward during the pulldown motion, this compound pulling/leaning movement does not apply transverse resistance to the desired muscle group. In other words, this lat pulldown device does not track the natural position of the muscles through a behind the neck pulldown motion. Finally, this machine can only be operated one arm at a time.
Perhaps due to costs, or due to a mistaken perception that the behind the neck pulldown exercise motion is relatively unimportant, applicant is unaware of any exercise machine which exercises the behind the neck pulldown muscle group in a sufficient manner.
It is an object of the invention to provide an exercise machine which maximizes the muscular benefit attainable during performance of a behind the neck pulldown motion by applying resistance against the natural body motion throughout this movement.
It is another object of this invention to provide a behind the neck pulldown exercise machine which is particularly suitable for exercising one arm at a time.
It is another object of the invention to provide a behind the neck pulldown exercise machine which combines the advantageous features of both free weight exercise and exercise machines without incorporating the attendant disadvantages normally associated therewith.